On Beauty (33 page)

‘I was heading up to Eleanor's house,' said Carlene, beaming, accepting hugs on either side from her two children, one of whom, Victoria, was looking over at Kiki like a jealous lover. Another young girl, plainly dressed, with a blue polo neck and pearls at her throat, held Michael's spare arm. His fiancée, Kiki assumed.

‘Kiki, I think we shall have to postpone our trip.'

‘The man claimed to know nothing –
nothing
– of the last four letters we sent him about the school in Trinidad. He'd washed his hands of it! Shame he didn't tell anyone at
our
end.'

‘And his accounts were
so
dodgy. I went through them. Something was definitely not right there,' added Michael.

Kiki smiled. ‘Sure thing,' she said. ‘Rain check – another day.'

‘Do you need a lift?' Monty asked Kiki gruffly, as the family turned to go.

‘Oh – thank you, no . . . there's four of you, and a cab wouldn't . . .'

The happy clan bustled away back down the platform, laughing and speaking over each other, as the Amherst train pulled away and Kiki stood with Carlene's hot chocolate in her hand.

on beauty and being wrong

When I say I hate time, Paul says
how else could we find depth
of character, or grow souls?

Mark Doty

A sprawling North London parkland, composed of oaks, willows and chestnuts, yews and sycamores, the beech and the birch; that encompasses the city's highest point and spreads far beyond it; that is so well planted it feels unplanned; that is not the country but is no more a garden than Yellowstone; that has a shade of green for every possible felicitation of light; that paints itself in russets and ambers in the autumn, canary-yellow in the splashy spring; with tickling bush grass to hide teenage lovers and joint smokers, broad oaks for brave men to kiss against, mown meadows for summer ball games, hills for kites, ponds for hippies, an icy lido for old men with strong constitutions, mean llamas for mean children and, for the tourists, a country house, its façade painted white enough for any Hollywood close-up, complete with a tea room, although anything you buy from there should be eaten outside with the grass beneath your toes, sitting under the magnolia tree, letting the white upturned bells of blossoms, blush-pink at their tips, fall all around you. Hampstead Heath! Glory of London! Where Keats walked and Jarman fucked, where Orwell exercised his weakened lungs and Constable never failed to find something holy.

It is late December now; the Heath wears its austere winter cloak. The sky is colourless. The trees are black and starkly cut back. The grass is hoary with a crunch underfoot, and the only relief is the occasional scarlet flash of the holly-berries. In a tall, narrow house that backs on to all this wonder, the Belseys are spending their Christmas break with Rachel and Adam Miller, very old college friends of Howard who have been married longer even than the Belseys. They have no children and do not celebrate Christmas. The Belseys have always loved visiting the Millers. Not for the house itself, which is a chaos of cats, dogs, half-finished canvases, jars of unidentifiable food, dusty African masks, twelve thousand books, too many knicks and a dangerous density of
knacks. But the Heath! From every window the view commands you to come outside and enjoy it. The guests obey despite the cold. They spend half their stay in the Millers' small brambly garden that makes up for its size by ending where the Hampstead ponds begin. Howard, the Belsey children, Rachel and Adam were all in the garden – the kids skimming pebbles into the water, the adults watching two magpies build a nest in a high tree – when Kiki pushed up a triple sash window and walked towards them, holding her hand over her mouth.

‘She's dead!'

Howard looked at his wife and felt only slightly alarmed. Everybody he truly loved was right here with him in this garden. Kiki came very close to him and hoarsely repeated her message.

‘Who – Kiki,
who's
dead?'

‘Carlene! Carlene Kipps. Michael – that was him, the son, on the phone.'

‘How on earth did they get this number?' asked Howard obtusely.

‘I don't
know
 . . . I suppose my office gave . . . I can't believe this is
happening
. I saw her two weeks ago! She's being buried here, in London. In Kensal Green Cemetery. The funeral's on Friday.'

Howard's brow contracted.

‘Funeral? But . . . we're not going, surely.'

‘YES, we're going!' shouted Kiki and began to cry, alerting her children, who now came over. Howard held his wife in his arms.

‘OK, OK, OK, we're going, we're going. Darling, I'm sorry. I didn't know that you . . .' Howard stopped talking and kissed her temple. Physically, it was the closest he'd been to her in an age.

Only a mile down the hill, in leafy Queen's Park, the numb practicalities that follow a death were being attended to. An hour before Michael phoned Kiki, the Kipps family had been asked to step into Monty's study – Victoria, Michael and Amelia, Michael's fiancée. The tone of the request girded them for yet more distressing news. It was a week earlier, in Amherst, that they had discovered
the cause of Carlene Kipps's death: an aggressive cancer she had told her family nothing about. In her suitcases they found painkillers, of the kind only hospitals prescribe. The family did not yet know who had prescribed these; Michael was spending a good deal of his time shouting down the phone at doctors. It was easier to do this than to wonder why his mother, who must have known she was dying, had felt the need to hide the fact from the people who loved her most. In trepidation the young people came into the room and arranged themselves on Monty's badly sprung Edwardian furniture. The blinds were shut. A floral-tiled fireplace with a small log fire was the only light in the room. Monty looked tired. His pug eyes were stained red, and his unbuttoned, dirty waistcoat hung either side of his belly.

‘Michael,' said Monty, and passed his son a small envelope. Michael took it from him.

‘All we can assume,' said Monty, as Michael drew a single piece of folded notepaper from it, ‘is that your mother's illness had already gone some way towards affecting her mind. That was found in her side table. What do you make of it?'

Over her fiancé's shoulder, Amelia craned to read what was written there and, when she did, let out a little gasp.

‘Well, first, there's no way this is legally binding,' said Michael at once.

‘It's written in pencil!' Amelia blurted out.

‘Nobody thinks it's legally binding,' said Monty, pinching the bridge of his nose. ‘That's hardly the point. The point is: what does it mean?'

‘She would never have written this,' said Michael solidly. ‘Who says this is her handwriting? I don't think it is.'

‘What does it
say
?' said Victoria and began to cry again, as she had been doing almost hourly for four days.

‘
To whom it may concern
,' began Amelia, wide-eyed as a child and employing a babyish whisper. ‘
Upon my death I leave my Jean Hyp – Hyp
– I can never say that name! –
painting of Maîtresse Er – Erzu
 . . .'

‘We know which bloody painting it is!' snapped Michael. ‘Sorry, Dad,' he added.

‘. . .
to Mrs Kiki Belsey
!' announced Amelia as if these were the most remarkable words she'd ever been called upon to say out loud. ‘And it's signed by Mrs Kipps!'

‘She didn't write that,' said Michael again. ‘No way. She never would do something like that. Sorry. No way. That woman obviously had some power over Mum that we weren't aware of – she must have had her eye on that painting for a while – we know she'd been in the house. No, sorry, this is completely out of order,' concluded Michael, although his argument had neatly double-backed on itself.

‘She bedevilled Mrs Kipps's mind!' yelped Amelia, whose innocent imagination was infected by some of the more gaudy episodes in the Bible.

‘Shut up, Ammy,' muttered Michael. He turned the note over as if its blank side might offer a clue to its provenance.

‘This is a family matter, Amelia,' said Monty severely. ‘And you are not yet family. It would be preferable if you kept your comments to yourself.'

Amelia held on to the cross at her throat and lowered her eyes. Victoria rose up from her armchair and snatched the paper from her brother. ‘This is Mum's handwriting. Absolutely.'

‘Yes,' said Monty, sensibly. ‘I don't think there is any question of that.'

‘Look, that painting is worth, what? About three hundred grand? Sterling?' said Michael, for the Kippses, unlike the Belseys, had no horror of talking frankly about money. ‘Now there is absolutely no way,
no way
she would have let this fall out of the family . . . and what confirms it for me is that she'd already sort of mentioned, pretty recently –'

‘Giving it to us!' squeaked Amelia. ‘As a wedding present!'

‘As it happens, she had,' agreed Michael. ‘Now you're telling me she left the most valuable painting in the house to practically a stranger? To Kiki Belsey? I don't think so.'

‘Wasn't there any other letter, anything else?' asked Victoria bewilderedly.

‘Nothing,' said Monty. He passed a hand over his shiny pate. ‘I can't understand it.'

Michael whacked the arm of the chaise he sat upon. ‘Thinking of that woman taking advantage of somebody as ill as Mum – it's disgusting.'

‘Michael – the question is how should we deal with this?'

And now the practical hats of the Kippses were put on. The women in the room were not offered hats and instinctively sat back in their chairs as Michael and his father leaned forward with their elbows on their knees.

‘Do you think Kiki Belsey knows about this . . .
note
?' said Michael, barely allowing the last word the credence of its own existence.

‘This is what we don't know. She's certainly made no claims. As yet.'

‘Whether she knows or not,' flashed Victoria, ‘she can't prove a thing, right? I mean she has no written evidence that would stand up in court or whatever. This is our
birthright
, for fuckssake.' Victoria allowed sobs to take her again. Her tears were petulant. It was the first time death in any form had ever forced its way into the pleasant confines of her life. Running alongside the genuine misery and loss was livid disbelief. In every other walk of life when the Kippses were hurt they were given access to recourse: Monty had fought three different libel cases; Michael and Victoria had been brought up to fiercely defend their faith and their politics. But this – this could not be fought. Secular liberals were one thing; death was another.

‘I don't want that language, Victoria,' said Monty strongly. ‘You'll respect this house and your family.'

‘Apparently I respect my family more than Mum did – she doesn't even
mention
us.' She brandished the note and, in the process, dropped it. It floated listlessly to the carpet.

‘Your mother,' said Monty, and stopped, shedding the first tear his children had yet seen since this began. To this tear Michael was unequal: his head fell back against the cushions; he let out a shrill,
agonized croak and began to weep angry choking tears himself.

‘Your mother,' tried Monty again, ‘was a devoted wife to me and a beautiful mother to you. But she was very sick at the end – the Lord alone knows how she bore it. And this,' he said, retrieving the note from the floor, ‘is a symptom of sickness.'

‘Amen!' said Amelia and clutched her fiancé.

‘Ammy,
please
,' growled Michael, pushing her off. Amelia hid her head in his shoulder.

‘I'm sorry to have shown it to you,' said Monty, folding the paper in half. ‘It means nothing.'

‘No one thinks it means anything,' snapped Michael, wiping his face with a handkerchief Amelia had thought to produce. ‘Just burn the thing and forget about it.'

Finally the word was out there. A log popped loudly, as if the fire were listening and hungry for new fuel. Victoria opened her mouth but said nothing.

‘Exactly,' said Monty. He scrunched up the note in his fist and tossed it lightly into the flames. ‘Although we should invite her to the funeral, I think. Mrs Belsey.'

‘Why!' cried Amelia. ‘She's nasty – I saw her that time in the station and she looked right through me like I didn't even exist! She's uppity. And she's practically a Rastafarian!'

Monty frowned. It was becoming clear that Amelia was not the quietest of quiet Christian girls.

‘Ammy has a point. Why should we?' said Michael.

‘Clearly, in some way your mother felt close to Mrs Belsey. She'd been left alone a lot in the last few months, by all of us.' Upon hearing this obvious truth, everyone found a spot on the floor to focus on. ‘She made this friend. Whatever we think of it, we should respect it. We should invite her. It's only decent. Are we agreed? I don't suppose she'll be able to make it anyway.'

A few minutes later the children filed out again, feeling a degree more confused as to the true character of the person whose obituary was to appear in tomorrow morning's
Times
: Lady Kipps, loving wife of Sir Montague Kipps, devoted mother of Victoria and Michael,
Windrush
passenger, tireless church worker, patron of the arts.